Category: Announcements

Today Patricia Beebe, President and CEO, of the Food Bank of Delaware wrote an editorial piece for The News Journal which I think you should read.

She wrote about what we already know about looming budget cuts, but explained how it will actually impact real people who work hard. We know how important nutritional security is, it isn’t just about how much food someone has or doesn’t have, but also about the quality of the food they have access to and how consistently they have access to it. Healthy food really impacts our lives in so many ways. If you can’t eat healthy then you won’t feel good, you won’t be able to do your best in anything, not at school or at work.

“Congress has just passed a budget resolution that proposes cutting the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program by $150 billion dollars, more than 20 percent, over the next 10 years. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that this will either end benefit eligibility for millions of families or drastically reduce the number of SNAP dollars available to the millions of families, seniors and people with disabilities who rely on the program to meet their nutritional needs.”

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Recently, we sent three big boxes of items down to Clear Lake Food Pantry at Clear Lake Baptist Church in Houston, Texas, to help them with their efforts in assisting those who were impacted by Hurricane Harvey. We sent 3B Brae’s Brown Bags with healthy food, clean water and messages of hope, but we also sent t-shirts, tooth brushes and things like that.

Soon after Harvey hit, as we all know, Irma then hit and destroyed whole islands in her path along with many many homes. We’re looking for places to assist in Florida and in the US Virgin Islands, but we realize there are many places still flooded, without power, and many down trees, so we’re playing it by ear and trying to figure out the best way to help.

In the meantime there are plenty of non-profits in Florida who are already there doing good work and helping people in need. It is suggested not to send things like clothing unless specifically asked especially since smaller places may not have a way to store things.

Governor Kenneth Mapp of the US Virgin Islands has expressed that while they are getting help, they need more. He asked that people who’d like to help log onto USVIrecovery.org.

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Friendly Reminder

Also, just as a reminder to people local in Delaware, Brae’s Brown Bags will be at the Read House and Gardens Farm 2 Fork event hosted by the Delaware Historical Society on Saturday, September 16th from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. Enjoy a family friendly backyard expo that brings together several community organizations to explore urban gardening and food access through fun, educational hands on activities. Bring donations for the Food Bank of Delaware!

She donated a signed copy for to raffle off at our 4th Annual 3B Summer Celebration.

Braeden will also be signing this particular copy, because he is one of the leaders featured in her book!

Thank you to Principal Timm from Carrie Downie Elementary in the Colonial School District for sharing a photo and a shout out on Twitter about this book, that was very cool!

It is true that with all of the information online it can be hard to know what is real. My Mom drills that into my head because she says I need to know the sources of my information. And I think that is important. There is a lot of information on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and it can be a really great resource. We can learn a lot with everything we have at our fingertips. We can also learn things that are not true and we can spread bad information when that happens.

So for kids like me, if I am going to have a blog and I am going to be on social media then I want to make sure I am being a leader. I have emailed and tweeted to legislators, it has helped me connect to policy makers who can make a difference. It is possible. Be a voice for positive change. #SocialLEADia

And grown ups like our parents and our teachers can show us the best way to use things like this, too. My Mom is my friend on all my social media networks. I don’t think she would let me use them otherwise, haha.

Thank you to Jennifer Casa-Todd for including me in your book, I was very excited to get it in the mail. I am so glad that there are books like this because we really do have a lot of ways to advocate and empower and inspire each other, so we should use them.

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In recognition of public service and food insecurity/hunger relief we invite children ages 5 to 12 to create a poster for us to display at our celebration!

The theme for our event is ‘Ohana so please try to incorporate the theme into your poster and make sure it reflects what 3B is all about which is helping those in need and empowering youth to get involved in service!

Contest Rules:

Your poster cannot be larger than 12 inches by 18 inches, not 3-Dimensional.

Students may use crayons, chalk, colored pencils, charcoal, water colors, oil pastels or markers. Projects should be completed by students only and be turned in with a completed entry form attached to the back of the art. Download the form here: 3B-Summer-Poster-Contest-2017

The contest is open to any child who lives or attends school in Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania or New Jersey and who will be able to attend our 3B Summer Celebration on Saturday, August 19, 2017 from 1pm to 4pm.

Contest entries should be mailed to the following mailing address and postmarked no later than August 4, 2017:

3B Brae’s Brown Bags
950 Rue Madora Drive
Bear, DE 19701

Voting:

All artwork will be scanned and posted on the 3B Brae’s Brown Bags Facebook page and we will be asking our fans to vote on the posters. Facebook albums will be created for ages 5 to 8 and then ages 9 to 12 during the first week of August. Fans will get 7 days to vote and the top 2 voted posters in each age group will be displayed at our celebration on Saturday, August 19, 2017 at the Bear-Glasgow YMCA between 1pm and 4pm.

Prizes

Top 2 voted posters in each age group will be displayed at our celebration

The top 2 winners in each age group will be recognized at the event during Brae’s speech and will be given event t-shirts as well as other special artsy goodies! So please make sure you are available to attend on August 19!

If you have questions please contact Brae’s Mom, Christy Mannering, at christy@braesbrownbags.org.

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The past few days have been so busy that I don’t know where to start so I’m just going to go in order of when it all happened.

So last week I found out that I was selected for the 2017 Christina School District Middle School Band. I play percussion. I’ll be playing the Timpani. So that’s really cool and my family is really proud of me and excited for me. A few of my friends also made it, like Milan, he plays trumpet.

So I found out that I am in the top 5 projects across the nation for the Jefferson Awards LEAD360 Challenge. The winning project gets activated nationwide which means we will be able to launch 3B Ripples across the country and help provide people in need everywhere with healthy food while also activating the service project in schools across the US. The winner is picked based on voting. You can vote on the LEAD360 Web Page and also on the Jefferson Awards Facebook page.

And then the Jefferson Awards Foundation has Students in Action projects over the weekend. And it was really cool because Central Indiana packed Brae’s Brown Bags! They even did an awesome #mannequinchallenge while packing and I’m definitely going to plan on doing that during our hunger conference in April. So even though I couldn’t be there they still included me on everything because they were tweeting to me and sharing the process. I was able to record a quick message for them, too. So I was able to let them know that I am grateful for their service.

Then on Saturday in Seaford, Delaware, my Mom and I visited their Students in Action and I was able to talk to some of the students. They packed about 80 bags of healthy food which was then donated to Jim Martin at the ACE Peer Resource Center in Seaford.

Please take time to watch a video about the ACE Peer Resource Center. Jim Martin has been alone, he has been there, he has been homeless, he knows what that feels like on a personal level. He talked to us to try and help us understand. When someone comes in off the street they are exhausted, they are alone, they are hungry and sometimes all the need is a warm place to sit, to get something to eat and put on a pair of new socks. He is a very good man and he is helping a lot of people. I’m proud of the Students in Action for their service and I’m happy the ACE Peer Resource Center received the bags.

Then on Sunday the 3B team went to Rehoboth Beach to do the Polar Bear Plunge! We raised over $1,000 for the Special Olympics! My stepdad took this picture with me, mom Mom, my brother Finn and my sister Amelia. Before we jumped into the 41 degree water. Well, me, my Mom and my Gram went in the water. I still can’t believe my Mom and my Gram went in the water. But they did! My Dad and Mom Mom and brother Michael and my Grandmom and Grandpop and Aunt Kristin were all there to watch us be crazy! The radio said over $900,000 was raised all together by the plungers yesterday!

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It’s not that I don’t like school. I mean I do like some school. But this week is my last week of 6th grade and I’m ready, I’m so ready for summer vacation! I was just inducted into the Junior National Honor Society at Gauger-Cobbs Middle School which is cool. Middle school wasn’t super easy but I made a lot of great new friends. There’s a couple people I play Minecraft online with sometimes and that’s a lot of fun for me. I’m ready for a break from school, for time to swim and have fun.

2nd graders and me at St. Anne’s Episcopal School

So I wanted to share with you about the 2nd graders at St. Anne’s Episcopal School in Middletown, Delaware. They held a used book sale and made a profit of $1,500. They chose to donate this money to Brae’s Brown Bags! They worked together as a team. They did marketing, sales, accounting, communications, etc. They worked VERY hard and it shows in how much they were able to raise. I had a chance to quickly visit with some of them and hear what they did. They presented me with a check and I sat with them and we had a quick Q& A. They are some pretty incredible students and I’m honored they chose 3B as a cause they wanted to support.

In a couple weeks I’m going to a music camp at the University of Delaware. It’s a Steel Drum and Afro-Caribbean Drumming Camp. I’ve been taking drum lessons at the Delaware Arts Conservatory so I’m excited!

93.7 WSTW has confirmed they will be attending our 3rd Annual 3B Summer Celebration and I’m so happy about that news!

As of this date we have not yet received any sponsor applications for our 3rd Annual 3B Summer Celebration. Please consider joining forces with 3B for what is our biggest and only annual event to help share our mission with our community and raise funds to help keep us as self-sustained as possible.

We can confirm our theme though AND show you our event artwork created by the art teacher I had when I was at Keene Elementary. All of our materials this year will feature Mr. Graham’s artwork. Check it out on our Eventbrite page, although tickets are not yet available but hopefully will be soon and we will let you know on our social media accounts!

Two years ago I created my own event it was a thank you event and it was for my foundation and even though it was a free event to attend we used Eventbrite to help plan and manage the event. The name of the event is 3B Summer Celebration and we will hold our 3rd Annual 3B Summer Celebration on August 20, 2016. This year we do have a theme and it is a “Ripple Effect” because I have expanded my Brae’s Brown Bags to reach out into schools. By helping schools start their own 3B Ripple Student Chapters we are now activating youth to get involved in service while also expanding the reach of our program to low-income populations in communities outside or own. We will have a bag packing station at this event and we will give certificates to every student who attends as a representative of an official 3B chapter.

The 3B Summer Celebrations are awesome because everyone comes out to support a program which I started when I was 9 years old and I know the biggest reason Brae’s Brown Bags is successful is because we have so much encouragement from family, friends, schools, other non profits and legislators like Senator Bryan Townsend and Representative Paul Baumbach. We have used Eventbrite each year and will be again this year once we get our location confirmed. It’s great to get a big group of people together who are all interested in making a different and supporting a good cause. I think each year we get new people but we also get friends who first met at our first celebration in 2014 which is cool to see our guests reuniting.

Last year we tried a feature Eventbrite offers where even though our tickets are free we said if people donated any amount they would be guaranteed an event t-shirt. We are hoping this year that will be more successful for us especially since the artwork is one-of-a-kind and uniquely made for 3B. The past two events have been really fun. We had a silent auction and raffles which were fun but it’s definitely tricky figuring out things really far in advance because most places need at least three months to know if they can donate or sponsor you.

The best advice we can tell other people who are planning events is to not be shy about promoting it. Work with local radio stations and research event calendars that allow you to submit your event so that it shows up for people. We use social media and Eventbrite connects with our social media accounts to make this very easy. We can publish to our Facebook and Twitter accounts straight after we create the event on Eventbrite. This is very helpful so we don’t have to remember to do it in multiple locations.

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And sooooo wow it is May 5th already. I’ll be done 6th grade in about a month. Time flies.

Me with Gwen Stefani and Whitney Stewart

For those of you who do not follow me on social media (and you should!) then you might not know all of the details of my trip to Los Angeles. I did receive a Disney Hero for Change Award and I did talk in front of 7,000 people and I did learn to use a teleprompter which I really liked and I wish my Mom could have one with us all the time!

The end of the red carpet walkThe Radio Disney Music Awards was a lot of fun and I know I will remember it forever. I made a new friend in Whitney Stewart who was the other award winner. She was very nice and I can tell she really enjoys being a leader with the Boys & Girls Club. I was able to meet Gwen Stefani and she is very nice. She kept saying that she didn’t think she did well when she received her award and I think she is crazy. Her speech was very nice and she spoke from her heart. So if Gwen ever reads this I hope she knows she is being too hard on herself.

I got to walk on the red carpet before the event. That was a lot different than I thought it would be. Some of the actors and actresses were being yelled at to look at different cameras. They must have been really important but I wouldn’t want to be yelled at. The red carpet is very long and even though you get announced at the beginning one at a time it still gets really crowded. There were A LOT OF cameras!

Backstage I got to talk with People Magazine and Entertainment Tonight and have my picture take with a bunch of people. And a dog, a Pomeranian which really looked like a toy but it wasn’t a toy it was real. There was an after party where people did a lot of dancing and jumping and I ate not one but two cookies on a stick. That’s right. Cookies on a stick. It is a genius idea.

This award is a really big honor and I am very humbled to have been chosen.

I couldn’t do everything I am doing with 3B without all of the people who encourage me every day.

So in the last couple of weeks I have also had a chance to talk with two groups of students about 3B and food insecurity and how they can help. I went to MOT Charter and talked with all of their 2nd graders and then I went to Calvary Baptist Church in Newark to talk with their youth group. I think my favorite part is when I get asked questions. At MOT Charter I think every student wanted to ask questions. They were so excited. They have packed bags in the past for 3B to give out during the winter months which was very helpful. The youth group at Calvary Baptist packed 50 bags just last night and they seemed to really enjoy helping out. I hope I am able to work with both of these groups again.

YouDee mascot with 3B bagMy Gram and Pop Pop were at the Ag Day event for me. They said there were a lot of people and it was a great turn out. My Gram said a lot of people knew about 3B and other people were excited to learn more, especially about the 3B Ripple Student Chapters. She said everyone took something like a pen or a brochure. I am sorry I missed Ag Day because it is always a lot of fun and I like seeing people at the University of Delaware because a lot of the students have had events with me and they stop by to say hi.

There are a couple other events coming up which will be fun but I will talk about them later.

We also just announced our SAVE THE DATE for our 3rd Annual 3B Summer Celebration. It will be held on Saturday, August 20, 2016. Location to be announced. Mr. Graham, my art teacher from when I was in elementary school at Keene Elementary, he is designing the artwork for the event. That’s pretty cool. So please put it on your calendar and I hope to meet all of you there!

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So I just want to really quickly thank two companies for recently helping us out.

One is the Pencader Reybold Self Storage people because they are donating a storage unit for us to use. We have had our supplies split between my great-grandparents, grandparents and my house because we didn’t have room for everything. Now we have one place we can put everything. Our friends at the Greater Newark Boys & Girls Club of Delaware helped us connect with Reybold. This is a really big help to us. We were able to put a couple dozen cases of water in last week and this week we will be able to put in more supplies.

Which then leads me to thanking Mazda (North American Operations) because when my Mom emailed them to ask them who printed our 3B logo on the brown bags after I won the Mazda Drive 4 Good, they not only connected her to that company but they also decided to donate money to our foundation to help us cover the cost of ordering more bags in bulk. So in a couple of weeks a HUGE shipment of 3B brown bags will be delivered and now we have a place to put them thanks to Reybold.

See how it all worked out?

Thank you Reybold and thank you Mazda. You guys rock!

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I am officially a middle schooler. I started 6th grade at Gauger-Cobbs this week. Our mascot is a cobra. I am going to try out for soccer next week. I’m really excited about that, I’ve been wanting to play soccer. I have a locker and we change classes. I have four minutes in between each class. There are A LOT of people in school. So far all my teachers are really nice and I like it.

Yesterday, there was an article that went onto the CNN Health website about young chefs who are paying it forward. It talked about me and also my friend Haile Thomas. Haile started the HAPPY Organization. She travels to teach kids about living and eating healthy. She is a really great chef and she won the Healthy Lunchtime Challenge in 2012. She’s really cool and we even had her and her Mom come out to Delaware in May because I knew she would be the perfect person to show the kids at the hunger conference how simple it is for them to make healthy snacks all on their own.

Also this week my Mom finished up the application for the 3B Ripples Student Chapters program. I came up with this idea for a couple reasons. One because I really want to be able to reach more people in need and I know I can’t do it by myself. But I also really think that other kids probably like to help and to give just like me. And I think that maybe having something in school to help them get into volunteering will make them feel happier and make them look forward to something else in school.

I also found out that I am receiving a special Rising Star in Philanthropy award in November. My friend Caitlin Custer who works at the Food Bank of Delaware, she nominated me and I am so very happy that I was picked for this award. It’s exciting. It makes me feel good that she thought of me and that the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) also thinks that I am a rising star. I will also be on a panel to talk to people about philanthropy on November 17 at the Chase Center. You should come if you can. NATIONAL PHILANTHROPY DAY 2015

There’s a very nice lady named Linda Prickett she works at Waters (Alfred G.) Middle School in Middletown. She gave me bags of stuffed animals, Beanie Babies, to give to kids in need. I can add them to my 3B bags as an extra surprise for kids I meet at the soup kitchens. I think this will be perfect for the holiday season. I am very excited to be able to give out the animals.

And I would also like to thank Wells Fargo in Wilmington and Ms. Meredith for helping to collect school supplies for us to add to bags. Thanks to family and friends and Wells Fargo we were able to give out over 50 back packs with healthy snacks and school supplies to schools this Summer.

Two more things, okay maybe three more things or four…

One is that the Big Fish Grill in Glenn Mills, PA is donating to 3B Brae’s Brown Bags this month as part of their Women & Wine night. We had a fundraiser with them last year, too. They make REALLY yummy food! Like really! And it’s not just for women, anyone can go and enjoy the menu. This year they are even including a really delicious sounding dessert with candy in it!

I’m going to visit the Sunday Breakfast Mission in a couple weeks because I want to be able to partner with them and give them 3B bags and stuff for them to use and give out. I am happy to be able to work with them and I have bags to bring with me, too.

My Mom and I are flying to Florida on October 1st to meet the great people at St. Charles Borromeo Catholic School. They invited me to come talk to all the students about Brae’s Brown Bags and also about service and food insecurity. I’m pretty excited about it 🙂

So I think that is everything. I hope you all have a really great weekend. I’m pretty excited it’s a 3-day weekend. Happy Labor Day!

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Author

When I'm not riding my bike, skateboarding or playing video games, I'm doing homework or attending events for my nonprofit.
My non-profit is called 3B Brae's Brown Bags or 3B for short. A sub-project of this non-profit is called 3B Ripples and they are student chapters.
My ongoing mission is not only to feed people today, but to raise awareness about the problems of food insecurity and poverty, and empower and inspire youth across the nation to become part of the solution.